In many instances, the teething process whereby an infants' growing teeth break through their gums is often a difficult and painful process for the infant. In such instances, the parent(s) of the infant may provide the infant with a teether device which the infant may place in their mouth and next to their gums, so as to be able to suck and/or chew on the teether in an effort to sooth the gums and facilitate the teething process. There are, however, several problems with the teethers that are currently available.
For instance, the teethers currently available are often made from various plastic materials. Recently, however, there has been a large amount of publicity regarding the various dangers related to the chemical constituents of the plastics from which teethers have been made. Specifically, various chemical constituents from which plastic teethers are typically made, e.g., bisphenol A and/or phthalates, may leach out of the plastic and possibly into the mouth of the teething infant. This problem is of special concern with regard to infants because bisphenol and/or phthalates, which may leak from the plastic teether into the mouth of an infant or child, may mimic the growing child's endogenous hormones and are, therefore, considered harmful to growing infants and children.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for a device that will allow a user to ease the teething process and/or sooth their gums and yet avoid the possible hazards presented by the leaching of harmful chemical constituents out of the device that may result from the degradation of the plastics typically used in the manufacture of such devices. The present invention meets these and other such needs.